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Founder of Game Addiction Clinic Now Says Games Aren't Addictive

by Nick Breckon, Nov 25, 2008 8:00pm PST
Related Topics – Gaming Addiction

The founder of the Smith & Jones Centre, a game addiction clinic in Amsterdam, has turned the irony up to 11 by admitting to the BBC that games aren't actually addictive.

"These kids come in showing some kind of symptoms that are similar to other addictions and chemical dependencies," said Bakker to the Beeb. "But the more we work with these kids the less I believe we can call this addiction. What many of these kids need is their parents and their school teachers--this is a social problem."

Bakker opened the Smith & Jones Centre in 2006, and has since treated hundreds of patients who suffer from what appears to be an addiction to gaming. However, Bakker has now found that only 10% of the patients treated at his clinic had traditional drug-related addictions, leading him to believe that "addiction" may not be a relevant term to classify his patients' problems.

"It's a choice," he said. "These kids know exactly what they are doing and they just don't want to change. If no one is there to help them, then nothing will ever happen."

"If I continue to call gaming an addiction it takes away the element of choice these people have. It's a complete shift in my thinking and also a shift in the thinking of my clinic and the way it treats these people."

The American Medial Association last year backed down from classifying videogame addiction as a formal disorder following the publishing of a lengthy report on the subject. The AMA's report concluded: "As with findings on long-term aggression, there is currently insufficient research to definitively conclude that video game overuse is an addiction."


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Comments

14 Threads | 38 Comments
  • #36
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    By: 9emini x
    Reply
    Noone familiar with the comedy of Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones would name an addiction clinic "Smith and Jones"!

    Seriously tho', I'm reminded of A. Lindesmith's (that 'S' word again!) demonstration that opiate addiction is learned behaviour, and not a fate that befalls each and every user. [This so-threatened the FBN's (DEA's predecessor) heroin 'demonization' program, that Prof. Lindesmith's University was notified of a 'drug addict in their professorial midst'. The Bureau also likely wiretapped Lindesmith's phone. All this pre-WW2!]

    Was told recently by someone that they don't play games because they find them too addictive!
    Nov 26, 2008 1:05pm PST
  • #7
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    By: Shai-Tan x
    Reply
    the choice quote here is better imo:

    http://ve3d.ign.com/articles/news/43191/Most-Compulsive-Gamers-Not-Addicts

    I think the point being made in the original BBC article is that the compulsive behavior has a context. Abstinence based addiction programs don't consider social and developmental issues that underwrite the obsessive behaviors. World of Warcraft in particular is an IRC and voice chat room, a shared gaming experience, that is very appealing to individuals with a poverty of social interactions. It's presumably not easy to stop if there is no healthy alternative because these types of individuals typically won't have the social skills to develop deeper social relationships or don't have the confidence to go forward for various reasons. Game worlds in contrast are lower stress environments.

    Rather than look at addiction single-mindedly it would probably be more useful to look at co-morbidity of the gaming obsession with social anxiety, general anxiety, living conditions, interpersonal style, etc. The patients who show up at said clinic probably fit this model but the point needs to be made that it's a matter of degree. There are probably many players who play a little too much, however diagnostic criteria require significant life impairment as a result of said destructive behaviors
    Nov 25, 2008 9:01pm PST